P&R is using money from the States Transformation and Transition Fund for the project but Deputy Chris Green, who led the hearing, has questioned its “value for money”.
“There wasn’t a great deal of clarity about precisely what that money is going to be used for apart from basically making 200+ people redundant,” he said. “There was talking of re-skilling and re-deployment but in essence I think what it’s talking about is making people redundant.
Pictured: Deputy Chris Green led the hearing at the Castel Douzaine room.
“The Transformation and Transition Fund has been set up by the States of Guernsey to provide a once in a lifetime opportunity to really radically reform the public sector, to make it better and to make it more efficient. If we’re using £8million of that money simply to pay people off – to remove 200+ posts from government – I think you can raise queries about the value for money of that.”
Mr Whitfield defended the spend saying the “necessary, once in a lifetime” project is not “targeting the people” but rather the “inefficiencies in our system”. He said it will also fund the “tidal wave of digitalisation” and is confident the plans will save £10million each year going forward.
“There’s a lack of appreciation for how fundamentally important this is to government,” continued Deputy Green. “It’s a key component to the medium term financial plan and a big part of the savings that are required under that financial plan will come from the transformation, so if they’re not secured by this process then arguably it implies either cuts to other services or more taxes.”
Pictured: States Chief Executive Paul Whitfield.
Other possible issues raised throughout the hearing included a lack of communication between the Transformation Working Group and States committees, as well as having policy officers working across multiple committees rather than just one.
After being asked by Advocate Peter Harwood, Deputy St Pier said “clear identification upfront of benefits” is the “biggest weakness of the programme so far”. Despite believing there is “inevitably momentum for change” he admitted more needs to be done in order to measure the real benefits of the project.
“It’s a worthwhile challenge and stock check on our transformation,” said Mr Whitfield following the hearing. “Government and the public service are going through the biggest change and transformation we’ve done in Guernsey in modern times. It’s rightful that we should get a challenge but it’s rightful that we should have the ambition to actually change the way government services respond and act on behalf of its community.”
Deputy Green added: “On the whole I think it was a useful hearing but we’re still scratching our heads in terms of how exactly transformation is going to work and if it is actually going to provide the benefits. At the end of the day they want transformation to mean the quality of services is still there but you can do it for less money and I think there are some big questions.”